Bangkok

Strange things

Floating markets

Patpong

History lessons #1

History lessons #2

History lessons #3

History lessons #4

Tribe

Central Thailand is full of water, tucked as it is and lying low between the Gulf of Siam and the Indian Ocean. The upshot of this is that there are entire regions where canals take the place of streets. This is even true of Bangkok, where the canals are bus routes.

There are two very famous floating markets in Thailand. The one in Bangkok has more tourists than fish and so we avoided it. On the other hand, just 100 kilometres south of the capital is another vast floating market which has also been given over to the tourist trade, called Damnoen Saduak. We enjoyed it, it cannot be denied, although the sale of tasteless tchatchkais does manage to break the magic.
 
Still there is magic. The silent passing of the boats, ordering delicious soups from kitchen boats and passing long fruit stands is a thrill. When we parked our car, we met Anant (telephone (032) 346106), who runs an eco-tourist association and he told us more about the other, unknown markets.

To be fair, they are not entirely unknown, since even the Lonely Planet, our boon and our bane, discusses them. You cannot help but be discouraged, since the other markets take place on alternative days of the waxing and waning moon and the only way to find out when they are is to get hold of a lunar calendar; but that doesn’t solve the problem of finding out where they are on alternative days of the waxing and waning of the moon.

Enant knew where they were, of course, since he was native to the area, and took out his lunar calendar and found out when they were and a date was set. We were to come down the night before the next market, in two days time and be ready to set off the next morning at 6 A.M.

In the mean time, while all of this was happening, another miracle was unfolding at another place. A simple click on your mouse will send you back to Aqaba in Jordan where we met Eric and Violaine, a French couple crazier than ourselves who are touring the planet on bicycle. It wasn’t so simple for us to find each other again. The only news we had ever received was from Pakistan, a letter they sent using someone else’s e-mail address. For some reason the highways of cyber-space were blocked. They couldn’t communicate with us and all of our letters to them came back ‘address unknown’.

Enter snail mail. We sent a postcard from Bangkok to Lyon France to Violaine’s parents who then forwarded our e-mail to Eric and Violaine who were in Bangkok themselves at that very moment. Our not meeting them for one entire year was a comedy of errors, and when we finally did meet and retraced our steps we discovered that often we were on the same island at the same time and once even in the same building at the same time, the French Embassy in Delhi India!

Dear reader, please excuse this plunge into details. You must understand how important it is for us to find people of like mind and inspiration along this long and strange road. Eric and Violaine, Philippe and Laure, Cecile of Bhuj…all precious and all too rare.

The upshot is that when we did return to the lesser known floating markets it was as two couples. Anant made his home open to us, offering us room and board and Terminator 1 on DVD. Early the next morning we set out. Long before dawn when the earth smells fresh and green. During mornings like this you are grateful for coffee, silence and the timid first singing of birds.

The road to the canals went through villages and was lined with palm trees. Women washed their hair by plunging into the green water.

The markets we visited with his boatman were country markets with the fresh produce of country markets. Most of the sellers were women, wearing round straw hats mounted on a frame to let the cool river air pass through while protecting them from the sun. Many were old women, their mouths red from chewing pan, and they cradled a grandchild or two between their legs while exchanging gossip with their girlfriends.

A boat went by with a young Buddhist monk collecting offerings which Anant’s wife had prepared for us.

The rising sun sent sparkling ricochets of light on the water. We were in a time out of time, and of course that kind of experience makes you hungry.

The food! It is best to go hungry to a floating market and never eat too much. Just around the corner will be another boat kitchen, with even tastier morsels. The noodle soups! The yellow steam baked cakes! The fresh watermelon cracking between our teeth!

Magic.



Mair